The urgency to find a solution to huanglongbing (HLB), also known as citrus greening disease, is why citrus is an initial focus of Florida’s Crop Transformation Center (CTC). The University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) and the state’s citrus industry established the center three years ago.
Through the CTC, faculty at the main UF campus in Gainesville and at the Citrus Research and Education Center (CREC) in Lake Alfred are working to find citrus varieties that can tolerate or resist HLB.
“Our purpose is to use cutting-edge tools — like gene editing, precision breeding and artificial intelligence (AI)-driven data analysis — to create plants that are healthier, more productive and more resilient to challenges like disease and climate stress,” said Charlie Messina, director of the CTC and a UF/IFAS professor of horticultural sciences. “We use AI to study how proteins in bacteria and plants interact, so we can stop the bacteria from taking over the plant and messing up how it works.”
Researchers at the CTC are identifying key genes that give plants natural tolerance to HLB, introducing those traits into new citrus varieties and testing them in collaboration with Florida growers.
The CTC is rethinking the traditional academic research pipeline by streamlining each step to move discoveries from the lab to the field faster. “Our ultimate goal is simply to accelerate innovation in agriculture, protect Florida’s signature crops — starting with citrus — and ensure that science in the lab leads to lasting impact in the grove,” Messina said.
Scientists at UF/IFAS research and education centers are working with their colleagues in Gainesville to deliver data to growers. The CREC already had two transformation labs, said CREC Director Michael Rogers.
“Basically, the idea is to provide more resources to develop even more plants in a shorter amount of time that can be tested in the field,” Rogers said.
Alfred Huo, a professor of horticultural sciences in Gainesville and a CTC-affiliated faculty member, is one of about a dozen UF/IFAS faculty members who focus solely on HLB. “While we benefit from CREC’s extensive citrus resources, our optimized transformation protocols can help CREC and other Florida citrus researchers produce both transgenic and gene-edited materials more efficiently and reliably,” Huo said.
In labs on the main UF campus, scientists study genes, develop new plant materials and create improved citrus lines. When researchers see promising plants, those plants go to CREC, where scientists test them to see how well they grow, Messina said.
There are no finished products in growers’ hands yet. “Once we confirm the tolerance to citrus greening, the improved plants will reach farmers through nurseries that provide young trees for planting,” Messina said. He added that the CTC “has produced several promising transgenic lines with traits that show the plants might tolerate greening.”
Source: UF/IFAS
Share this Post